The Touched
by Noble Mira
Summary: Ten years after 'Graduation' Max and Liz each must deal with the consequences of their past decisions. As the world is endangered by hostile aliens, they must find the key to save their own lives and the lives of everyone else.
1. Prologue

**Title: The touched **

Author: Mira

**Rating:** Maybe a PG-13

**Pairing:** Max/Liz, Maria/Michael, Isabel/Alex, Isabel/Jesse, Kyle/Ava so far.

**Category:** Roswell, may slightly crossover into other fandoms but mostly it's AU post series.

**Disclaimer**: Roswell and any other shows making guest appearances here belong to people that don't happen to be me or anyone I know or am related to. I have no money and nothing worth pawning for cash. So please don't sue. Some of the strangers in my story are OC and belong to me so please ask me if you want em.

**Spoilers:** Basically anything from all seasons from 'the Pilot' through 'Graduation'.

**Feedback:** Feedback is very neat if you have the time. :D I like to know how to make it better and maybe even where to go next.

**Summary: **Ten years post-'Graduation' the decision that Max made one Christmas comes back to haunt the aliens and those close to them.

Prologue

_The King sighed as he settled into another cheap motel bed, the familiar itch of mass purchased bedspreads rustling against his bare arms. His beloved Queen was already far gone in sleep, her long hair fanned against the bleach white pillows as she wriggled to try to find a comfortable spot. They were on the move again after a long period of relative stability. Fortunately, this change of scenery was routine, a just in case… not like the one a year before when a run in with the local feds had almost spelled disaster for the whole royal family. In the next bed, he could see the familiar tousled heads of two of his peacefully sleeping children which always succeeded in bringing a smile to his face, even when he had what his kids liked to call the 'broodies'. He had been smiling a lot lately; things were after all looking up for once. Maybe they could all finally settle down for good this time, stop running and raise their families in peace and relative normalcy. The neon motel vacancy sign flickered and buzzed in a nod to nostalgia, seeing as neon signs had been disappearing from almost everywhere else to be replaced by the new and improved plasma screens. As he started to drift off to sleep to try and dream of the better future he would provide for his family, friends and subjects he was vaguely aware of an increased restlessness in his wife's sleep. He brushed off a little nagging worry chalking her restlessness up to her advanced stage of pregnancy. _

_The Queen lay there, time and possibility pulsing through her whole body, wave after wave of premonition filling every cell and the very fiber of her being, the power of the visions only amplified by the hybrid child she carried. The day she had been dreading for more than a decade was now upon them and their Enemy was coming to conquer and destroy everything she held dear--her family and her home. They all had done everything in all of their powers, both alien and earthly, to stave off the coming onslaught. The King had even come back in time, appearing in her childhood room full of warnings about this day. She had done as he'd asked; however, he had neglected to warn them of Tess' duplicity and Khivar's pervasive corruption. Had he known about the unexpected powers the human/hybrid partners would discover, gaining strength in their cooperation? She fleetingly wondered if he could have possibly known the consequences… by trying to keep Tess at their side, he had left them even more vulnerable when they lost her to betrayal and sacrifice instead of to neglect and jealousy as the future king had feared. _

_In the bleak potential of war and strife her vision was caught by a soft glimmer of hope and light. The vision wavered like a mirage and finally settled on a small raven haired woman standing with eyes downcast, her small form preternaturally still. The darkness loomed towards her and suddenly the dark haired woman looked up instantly wary. The Queen was shocked, but the force of her premonition moved her forward. It was Tess. Their eyes met for a brief moment. Then Tess' gaze turned back to the darkness, her large eyes widening briefly. Tess took up a shining sword and stood firmly, her body a small but fiery shield. Behind her small frame, the glow was growing brighter coalescing into a nursery full of children. The Queen's vision moved in for a closer look. Behind her, Kyle Valenti joined the dark haired Tess carrying a fearsome spear and shield and moving to also defend the nursery from the encroaching darkness. The glow surrounding the children grew brighter as they ran and played with wooden swords and spears laughing and morphing from toddlers to teens and back again, some juggled flame and some juggled Tabasco sauce. _

_One of the girls, currently a teen dropped her swords and approached the Queen. She seemed impossibly young to the Queen. She couldn't believe that she too had once been this age. The girl had long, bone straight honey brown hair hanging in acurtain to herankles. She fixedknowing black eyes on the Queen. She seemed to find what she was looking for in the Queen's eyes. Solemnly she handed the Queen a shining bow of smooth golden wood inlayed with silver and an ivory wrought quiver with just one gleaming black arrow. As the Queen accepted the weapon from theslender teen the hopeful glow grew nearly blinding and a voice sounded around them pressing in and through the two of them. The words tasted of power, but the Queen found she could not decipher their meaning. They felt ancient and terrible and set her spirit trembling. Once the echo of the words faded from the vision but not from her mind, the girl took another step towards the Queen. Just behind the nursery, the darkness had outflanked the two defenders. Very softly she whispered urgently to the Queen looking suddenly afraid, "Find the answer, save the children…" The darkness swelled and the girl turned and screamed, "The Dagger!" She picked up a sword and ran towards the darkness, but then disappeared. The vision abruptly fled the Queen and she felt herself falling…_

Sydney awoke quite suddenly as her body made hard contact with the floor.


	2. It's Not the Fall that Kills You

Disclaimer: While I think that little green men or grey men from Pluto would be cool, all of the aliens you recognize belong to Jason Katims and his posse of men with copyrights. I don't get money for this. Please don't sue.

A/N: Sorry it's been so long but my muse apparently went on an extended pilgrimage to somewhere very very far away for a very very long time. She's back for now we'll see how long it lasts. I hope that you enjoy this chapter.

Chapter One – It's Not the Fall That Kills You

From the convenience of her tangled heap of limbs on the soft plush of the area rug that mostly served as a landing pad these days, Sydney had a perfect view of the desert sun rising through her eastward facing window. Being sixteen wasn't awkward enough without the seeming inability to normally disembark from her bedding in the morning, she thought sarcastically. At least the view wasn't half bad. Though that was aided in part by the recently installed nearly life sized poster of singing sensation Luke Jackson on her ceiling. His warm brown eyes sparkled down on her with just a hint of mischief and a little bit of his trademark angsty goodness that appeared in all of his popular soulful ballads. Sydney's bestest friend Jen said that Luke was "an old soul in a hot young bod." Not that Sydney could really disagree, as was evident in the way in which the ceiling was decorated.

Shaking off the blissful rush of teenage hormones, Sydney closed her eyes, righted herself, relaxed her muscles and concentrated on remembering the dream that had instigated her daily launching onto the floor. She wanted to be sure to capture every detail of the usual dreaming in her mind with perfect clarity. Recording the nightly dreams had been a part of her morning ritual ever since she'd been old enough to commit them to paper. Though it had taken even longer to realize that the dreams might have more significance than she'd initially thought, she carefully kept that particular thought to herself, lest she be dragged away to see the psychologist or worse, the social worker. She'd considered confiding in her father, to whom she confided almost every other secret, small or large, knowing that he would never laugh at her or think her crazy. It was just that he worried so much about her already and since she still didn't know what the dreams meant, she would hate to add to his worrying with something that might be nothing.

Sydney recalled the details of the latest dream readily and smiled with barely contained excitement. Usually she was merely one of an invisible throng of spectators in her dreams; she could watch and listen and feel but never reach out to touch, or communicate in any way. Every other morning she awoke on the floor feeling just a little sad, just a little lonely missing the feeling of companionship that she shared with the other unknown spectators that always eluded her when she was awake, hiding in the sleepy folds of her pillow past dawn. This dream had been radically different from all of the thousands of dreams that she remembered having since she had come to live with her dad—she'd been able to interact this time. This time she had been able to give a warning to the dream woman. She, among all the other dreamers, had been able to make contact with one of _them_. _They, _the ones she thought of as Seekers, walked the dreamscape looking for answers to questions that Sydney had never been able to ascertain. Over the past year or so more Seekers had begun to make their way into the dreams, but most of them wandered around looking afraid and lost, trying to ignore the strange images that flowed through the bizarre mental landscape. Sydney thought that perhaps the influx of new Seekers might have something to do with the increased sense of urgency that all of the spectators had been noticing in the dream world. She knew of course that something huge was looming on the horizon. She wasn't sure what was going to happen but she did know that if she wasn't careful, she could get pulled into this mess along with everyone she knew from real life and from her dreams. She wished that she could remember what the voice had said or why she knew to say what she had said.

There were three main Seekers that visited her nightly dreaming, they didn't usually come together and they had never before noticed her presence but they were as much a part of her life as the people she knew from the waking world. Whenever they visited her, the dreaming inevitably became more intense, more vivid and sometimes more terrifying. The blonde one was her favourite. She almost always made her dreams feel happier, tinged with a sense of endless optimism and lots of red. The other two were always a little more… focused. The tiny elfin brunette always looked a little lost, unsure of herself, but made up for it by seeming tougher, scrappy. Her dream influence made Sydney want to lock herself in her darkened room with loud angry music. The third woman, the Seeker that she had finally been able to interact with had long brown hair and sad eyes and generally contributed to her more terrifying nocturnal visions. Sometimes, after one of those dreams, Sydney would be inconsolable, weeping at the drop of a hat. Luckily, most people chalked it up to PMS.

Confident that she had remembered all that she could, Sydney glanced up at the glowing numbers of her UFO shaped alarm clock… and sighed. Still excited but slightly frustrated, she continued on with the morning routine as it was past time to disembark from the floor and finish getting ready to face the day.

After putting the finishing touches on her dream journal she rushed through her basic school beauty regimen, which at the ripe old age of sixteen was still gratifyingly simple, Sydney paused only to glare at her hurriedly styled blondish ponytail that still only reached to mid back. She growled a little in frustration wishing she'd never ever let Jen and Millie talk her into a cutting off nearly all her hair when they were all in seventh grade. How long did hair take to grow back anyways? It was still far too short to her mind. Still feeling rushed for time, she left her hair pity party behind and rifled through the clean clothes piled on her computer chair finally coming up with an old green t-shirt with the fading caption, 'I'm a Roswell Alien' and a pair of only slightly wrinkled low-rise jeans. After a painfully long search, she managed to track down a complete pair of shoes and her wallet. Throwing everything crucial for a successful day of learning into her cramped messenger bag, she flew down the hall and into the kitchen. She was just in time to witness her dad muttering threats over a burning pan of tofu scramble while desperately trying to quell the blaze with his beloved bespattered apron formerly emblazoned with the phrase 'Kiss the cook' now looking slightly worse… err much worse for wear. Sydney grabbed the newest fire extinguisher and finished putting out the fire. Her dad just looked bewilderedly at the latest mess to grace their stovetop. He sighed and took out his wallet and dejectedly handed her a rumpled twenty. Sydney smiled and hugged her dad.

"Good effort Dad, I'm sure that you'll get it right next time."

He smiled at that, returning the hug with his usual intensity and with effort remembered to spare her teenage dignity and not ruffle her hair.

"There's always tomorrow luv," he said with a grin. "I'll see you after school at the museum?"

"It won't be till late today, Dad. I have library duty with Millie."

"Okay, no worries. The shipment for the new exhibit isn't due til tomorrow and the filing's mostly caught up so there's not a whole lot to do today."

"Kay, gotta go, I'll call you later to check in."

Sydney smiled and kissed her dad on his still scruffy cheek and hurried out the door to her dusty little green car, which also served as her locker most of the time. She launched her bag into its place of honor in the backseat and headed off to pick up Jen and hopefully some half-decent breakfast before class.

A/N Brownie points for everyone that knows who the singer is in homage to, though it is very vague.

Please Read and Review!


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